


and forget to live

by azurish



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Dreams, M/M, alternate universe - imaginary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-12
Updated: 2015-10-12
Packaged: 2018-04-25 21:05:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4976515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/azurish/pseuds/azurish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that.”<br/>In Albus’s dreams, his hair is red and Gellert’s kisses taste like honey.</p>
            </blockquote>





	and forget to live

            In Albus's dream, his hair is red-gold.  This is unsurprising; these days, all his dreams are parts of the same fugue, and one of the characteristics of its theme is that his hair has regained its old color. The dreams are like sestinas; they mix and match the same words, drawing on a limited stock of details, always leading to an inevitable coda.

            In this variation on the theme, the red of his hair is shot through with sunlight.  The dream itself is also shot through with sunlight, the warm, lazy, golden kind that true English summer never actually glows with, but which his memory attributes to Godric’s Hollow nevertheless.  Bees flit about the blooming garden and Dumbledores flit about the cozy house.  He washes breakfast dishes in the kitchen as his sister and brother finish eating and the soap smells of lemons.  The part of Albus that stands at a remove from his dream-self wants to pause, wants to drink in the details of his sister’s face, card his fingers through the red hair that’s just a shade more blond and less auburn than his own in the calming way Aberforth had mastered and he had never bothered to learn, but his dream-self traces out the groove he wore into this mental record at age nineteen and drags him away from her and out of the house.  He wanders down the dusty summer streets of Godric’s Hollow without a care, stops at the white gate that is still painfully familiar, and calls out to the boy working in Madame Bagshot’s garden.

            Gellert looks up and it’s always one of the most disconcerting leitmotifs in this phantasmal fugue, because their eyes meeting is a buzz of electricity in dream-Albus’s heart and a knife to that of the Albus who knows how this song ends.  There’s no reconciling the two sensations – the punch to his gut winding him just as his dream-self thinks he can breathe for the first time.

            Because it is a dream, Albus says, “I love you.”  It comes out delighted, because the waking part is the nightmare but this is still the dream part where he is young and love is simple: happiness and summer sunlight and intelligent eyes in an unlined face.

            And because it is a dream, Gellert’s laugh is kind and he crosses to the white gate and puts his palm on the peeling paintwork to steady himself as he leans forward to kiss Albus.  The kiss is sweet and tastes of honey.

            Albus wakes up.

*

            He can barely remember what he used to dream of before the notes of this all-consuming theme threaded their way through his nights.  He knows there was a time before Gellert, when he must have dreamed of power or glory or whatever it was you dreamed of when you were a Gryffindor smarter than your Headmaster, let alone your professors, hailed as the most powerful wizard of your age.  In a way, those had been dreams of Gellert, too; now, though, the dreams are less nebulous: power is sharply defined and glory tastes like honey-flavored kisses.  In this dream, his hair is red, but it is shot through with white, not sunlight.  Gellert’s hair has shaded from ash-blond to gray-blond, but he looks as dignified and leonine as ever.  In the dream, Albus is fixing Gellert’s collar at the breakfast table when his husband leans forward to kiss him.

            “You worry too much, Albus,” Gellert says, after they have broken apart.  “The children have much more exciting things to care about than the love lives of their Transfiguration professor and their Charms master.  No one’s going to write home to their parents; we’ll be fine.”

            Albus chuckles ruefully.  “Yes.  Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

            “I always am,” Gellert says.  “Now.  Eat your pancakes; you’ve got the Gryffindor first-years this morning, and you don’t want to face them on an empty stomach.”

            “Mm, that’s a horrifying thought,” Albus agrees, and then he smiles as Gellert spears a piece of pancake with his own fork and feeds it to him.  The china they’re eating off of is a set he hasn’t seen in years; he lost it during the move from the rooms he had as Transfiguration professor to the Headmaster’s suite.  The pattern is a simple Quidditch motif, crossed brooms interspersed with snitches, bludgers, and quaffles.  The part of Albus he can’t turn off that always wonders what Gellert would make of any given situation had rather thought his lover would have hated the china set, but dream-Gellert doesn’t seem bothered by it at all.

            Gellert doesn't look up from his newspaper when Albus leaves for his first class, but he brushes his fingers across Albus’s knuckles.  On his way out the door, Albus passes by a framed photo he’s never seen before.  Aberforth is sitting between him and Gellert at a table he recognizes from the front parlor of his childhood home.  A woman with strawberry blond hair sits across from the three of them, her back to the camera.  Aberforth’s smile is equal parts nervous and pleased and Albus wants to stay and memorize this picture of the family that's all gone now and never really existed, but his feet carry him out into the hallway and onto a route he’d hurried down innumerable mornings on his way to the Transfiguration classroom.

            When he wakes up, he debates getting out of bed and taking a quick stroll around the castle, as he does many nights to settle himself after particularly vivid dreams.  Tonight, the idea of wandering the hallways feels sour, so instead he rolls over and just breathes.  He watches the darkness outside his window turn gray.

*

            His dream that night is haunting and cold; it’s the fugue twisted into a minor key, the notes the same but darker.  A gold crown glitters on top of his red hair.  Gellert wears its twin and has never looked so radiant before – so beautiful, so powerful.  Gray doesn’t dare show itself in his hair.

            “Albus, if you would do the honors?” he says, and hands him a long, thin wand.

            “Of course,” Albus says, and the brush of their hands sends a shiver up his spine that is far headier than the rush of power that shoots through his veins as his fingers close around the Elder Wand.  He knows how it feels to wield the Elder Wand in real life, of course, so this part of the dream is far more solid than the rest.  Then again, he doesn’t know what it feels like to _share_ a wand with another wizard, but the dream supplies the melody he needs.

            He turns to the woman who has requested an audience before them.  “You say the Muggle men attacked your nephew?” he asks.

            Her hair is blond, and for a moment, he thinks it’s Ariana – he think he’s going to get to see Ariana grown up, and his heartbeat quickens, because that would truly be a treat, something worth remembering when he wakes up – but when she looks up her eyes are brown and her chin is far squarer than his sister’s had been.

            “Yes!  He was just playing at the playground – they came out of nowhere – I didn’t know what to do.  We Apparated away, but they’re still out there, they could still come across some innocent child just playing …”

            Gellert places a reassuring hand on her shoulder.  “We’d be happy to help, madam.  If you could provide Albus with their descriptions, we’ll bring them to justice.”

            When she has departed, when Albus has promised to hunt down the men in question, when he’s sent off a tracking spell to find them, Gellert turns to him and kisses him.  It’s breathless and hard and tastes like honey and sex.  “God, I love you like this,” Gellert whispers when they break apart.

            And the worst part is that a dream in a minor key is still a dream, not a nightmare, and Albus knows this when he wakes up alone in the large bed in the Headmaster’s quarters.

            Dawn is trickling, gray and cold, over the horizon, so Albus pushes back the covers and rises.  He pulls on a yellow dressing gown, waves the kettle on with an elegant flick of his wand, checks a few of the silver instruments in his study.  The kettle whistles, and he adds a dash of milk and a squeeze of honey to his tea before sipping it.

**Author's Note:**

> Also [cross-posted to my tumblr](http://azurish.tumblr.com/post/130986309585/and-forget-to-live-azurish-harry-potter-j).


End file.
